Pentagon: Iraqi PM requests sending more US troops

 

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com)— President Obama has authorized the deployment of an additional 1,500 American troops to Iraq in the coming months, doubling the number of Americans meant to train and advise Iraqi and Kurdish forces.

The trainers and advisers are to help Iraqis and Kurds as they plan a major offensive expected next spring against Islamic State fighters who have poured into Iraq from Syria.

During a conference call with reporters, senior administration officials denied that Mr. Obama waited until after the elections to announce the deployment so as not to alarm an already skittish electorate. “It’s being done now, quite frankly, because the Iraqis have demonstrated the willingness and the will to go after ISIL,” Admiral Kirby told reporters after the call, using another name for the Islamic State. Iraqi forces, he said, have “reached the point where they need additional help and guidance.”

Admiral Kirby said that Iraq’s new prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, had requested the help. “There was no political angle to the timing here,” he said.

 

 

Administration officials did not express any heightened concern, at least during the conference call, about the military effort. So far it consists largely of American airstrikes on Islamic State artillery positions, vehicles and, in a few cases, small patrol boats on the Euphrates River.

 

 

White House officials said the request for $5 billion will be presented to Congress during the lame-duck session that begins next week. Officials said the decision to send additional troops was based on what they said was legal authority the president already has from Congress. But they said the president wanted a new authorization from Congress for continuing American military action in Iraq and Syria, which Mr. Obama has said will last into the presidency of his successor.

“I do think that it points to the utility in the president working with Congress to formulate and implement our counter-ISIL strategy,” the official said. If Congress and the president are in agreement on a strategy against the Islamic State, the official said, “we send a more united message overseas.”

Iraqi and Kurdish forces have slowly begun pushing back and retaking territory threatened or captured by the Islamic State in recent weeks, including the Rabia border crossing with Syria, the oil refinery in Baiji north of Baghdad, the northern town of Zumar, and Jurf al-Sakhar, southwest of Baghdad. But officials said the major push will require training three new Iraqi Army divisions, more than 20,000 troops, in the coming months.

Since the departure of Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, the former Iraqi prime minister, American officials have been far more vocal about blaming him for what is widely viewed as a dismal initial performance by the Iraqi military against the Islamic State. On Friday, Admiral Kirby said that the new Iraqi government under Mr. Abadi has shown a new willingness to work to engage Sunni groups, including in Anbar, and to train its soldiers to stand and fight.

“We did spend a lot of money and effort training the Iraqi Army,” Admiral Kirby said. “When we left them in 2011, we left them capable.” He said the Maliki government “squandered” the American military’s training of Iraqi troops, but expressed optimism that things will be different now. “This is a completely different game,” he said, pointing to a recent visit by Mr. Abadi to Anbar Province to engage Sunni leaders in the fight against the Islamic State.

Administration officials said they expect international allies will help in the training effort and announced a commitment Friday of 120 military personnel from Denmark to the cause. /End/